Dreaded Muggle Appliances
This is just a small idea for the in-house Slytherin challenge the houses competition Slytherin Team is having to replace the drabbles for round 1. Not to mention it's a way to try and improve my horrible relationship skills, lol.
Challenge: write about something Slytherin (character, house, house members ETC.)
Prompt (optional): Waffles
Word Count: 996
Thank you VanillaAshes and CupCakeyy for beta'ing my story!
HP is not mine. This is an AU. And while this could be in the same universe as my stories Spellbound or Studying Ginny, it's not intended to be.
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Draco Malfoy served up the last of the waffles on a plate, dressing them with blueberries and maple syrup. He stepped back and admired his work, he couldn't help but feel very pleased.
He had only done waffles a few times before, but his attempts today were pretty good, or so he thought. He made sure he followed the recipe exactly, put the exact amount of all ingredients in, -no more, no less- and he even managed to cook the waffles without burning them! What more could one want? Draco didn't know, but he thought he was doing well to have achieved all of that, considering previous attempts.
Of course, it had taken many tries and a lot of cursing to get even this, but Draco wanted to do it. He wanted to be more useful around the house as his fiancée had dropped not so subtle hints along those lines, so he thought he'd try cooking again. Waffles were fairly easy to make, except for the fact he had to know how to use the dreaded muggle appliances.
It had never been easy since they moved into this house, as he had to learn how to do chores and use objects like the oven, but he had agreed for her. Ginny, his fiancée, had wanted to live near her family home, which was why when they moved in together and bought a house they chose here. Draco had been more than happy to oblige.
No matter how hard he tried to get used to living in a muggle environment, he still felt uncomfortable being surrounded by people he had been brought up to hate, even if they didn't have anything to do with them and could mostly live like normal wizards. Still, if they had lived at Malfoy Manor, he would have gone mad. The entire place was filled with memories and signs of times he'd rather forget.
It had been by chance he and Ginny had met; something he never in a hundred years would have ever imagined happening, and something he would never have believed if anyone had told him. It all started with "Are you alright?" when he found her in one of the corridors of Hogwarts, crying. He wasn't completely sure why he had asked, but perhaps he had simply wanted to prove he wasn't the same person he was before the war.
Ginny and Potter had gotten back together after the war, (they had only broken up to keep her safe,) but because of the temporary break-up, they were never the same. Apparently, after many arguments, the last very loud and nasty, Ginny Weasley and Harry Potter were broken for good, which was why Draco had found her crying in a corridor.
Despite the feud between their families, despite how horrible he had been to her and her brothers, Draco had stayed and talked to her until she had been better. He never expected to speak to her again, even if the war had changed them all. There was too much bad blood between, not to mention all the things he had done to her, her friends and family. He did speak to her again and they kept running into each other during and between classes. Eventually, he asked her out and she agreed.
If it weren't for the fact he had missed his seventh year and Ginny had done her sixth, it would not have been possible. For starters, he wouldn't have been at Hogwarts, and he'd never have sat next to her in classes as a result.
After school, they had both told their families they were dating. Unsurprisingly, the reactions had been everything from acceptance to saying they needed to break-up, albeit, the latter was his parents' reactions.
That had been part of their decision to not live in Malfoy Manor. Instead, they bought a small house in the same area as the Burrow. The downside was it was very muggle, much to Draco's dismay.
Outside their jobs, they worked hard and learnt to use and live like muggles (for their neighbors benefits,) to finally be semi-comfortable in their home. Though, after several incidents of nearly burning the house down, Draco had been banned from cooking, until now. Wanting to be able to cook something, Draco had secretly approached Granger to ask for help with cooking.
Today, he had gotten up early, and using all the things Granger had taught him, he had finally succeeded in making waffles. Just as he was about to go and wake Ginny, he heard her coming down the stairs. He thought something didn't add up. Had she not had a shower, or had he been so preoccupied he hadn't noticed?
"Draco? Are you up? What's that divine smell?" she asked as she came into the kitchen, dressed in her pink dressing gown. When she saw the waffles, Ginny stopped, shocked. "You made waffles and didn't burn the house down? You darling! But how? You're terrible at cooking!" Ginny came up and wrapped an arm around him.
"Yes, I got some help. I wanted to do something nice for you, so I asked Granger to give me some lessons so I could make waffles, at least," Draco said, looking embarrassed. Now that he had said it, he realised how pathetic it sounded that he needed lessons to do something that simple.
"Aww, that's very sweet of you." Ginny kissed him. "I'm so happy. You went through a lot of trouble."
"Thank you, Ginny," Draco said, going bright red. "Hopefully no more burning the house down." A soft smile tugged at his lips. "Shall we eat them? Hopefully they taste alright." While he had done everything right, he had been warned that food didn't always taste as it should.
"Yes! I'm sure they taste as good as they smell!" Ginny said, eagerly sitting down in her chair and digging in, Draco quickly following suit.
The waffles were just as good as they smelt.